“With Verplank?”
“Yes, that he had hunted with him in the States. And that reminds me. What have you decided about that horse?”
Silverstairs pulled at his straw-coloured moustache. “I’ll let you know to-morrow. When are you to be at home?”
“Any time after two.”
Silverstairs nodded. “Very good, I will drop in on you.”
From beyond, blue and vibrant, came the upper notes of a violin. In the now crowded salons a Roumanian, the rage of the season, a youth, very pale, with melancholy eyes, flowing hair and the waist of a girl, was executing a fantasy of his own.
De Joyeuse flicked a speck from his sleeve, threw back his noble and empty head, gave a circular look of inquiry, a little gesture of invitation, and accompanied by his friends, sauntered to the rooms without.
There, Barouffski after saluting Mme. de Joyeuse had engaged her briefly in talk. But her attention had been attracted rather than claimed by the Montebiancan prince, a young man extremely gentlemanly and equally modest who, with that diffidence which royals and poets share, stood bashfully at her side.
Barouffski, bowing again, passed on. During his short and entirely fragmentary conversation with Mme. de Joyeuse, his eyes had rummaged the room.
Leilah, meanwhile, rising from the sofa where she had been seated, moved with the inflammatory d’Arcy into the salon beyond.